Third textile Mill

>> Was the third textile mill in New Hampshire built? you got that right too. didn’t have anything to do with where I’m standing, did it? know. you knew all along the third textile mill was in this town. this is Hillsborough. water power here was very good from the start. the first saw mill was built here by a guy named Keyes in 1739. it was the first mill of any sort to be built on the river. in 1801, William slay was hired to be the pastor of the meeting house over in Deering. see we’re in Deering now. reverend slay was very popular with folks in had the town but not popular with the church fathers. he was glib, a wonderful speaker, but he was woefully deficient in his knowledge of the bible and failed his order nation examination and they refused to seat him. so, he started his own church. took most of the town with him. to run the machinery, he used one single horse that walked around a shaft. and it worked but it didn’t work very well. George little saw the machine, offered to purchase it from the reverend and he had just about come to the end of his welcome and he gladly took the money and ran. this was 1806. Mr. little moved the machinery down here to the river where he harnessed it to an undershot mill wheel. and like I say, this turned out

Hannah Hacket

>> Frit 1921, Hillsborough town history has a sweet story about a woman who lived here from the time of the revolutionary war until just after the civil war. her name was Hannah Hackett. she was born in Portugal, 1770, the daughter of a Portuguese naval officer. she was brought to Portsmouth New Hampshire about that time as a small child. she was taken into the family of Thomas murdo history does not record why she was in Portsmouth or why she was abandoned by her father, but with the murdos she traveled to Hillsboro and became as much a member of the family as any of his other children. she was then still a small child. in Hillsboro, Hannah Hackett received a solid education in the local schools and later herself taught school. once, she had charge of one of the murdo children and went out to pick berries. in the very patch, a huge black bear approached, stood on his hind legs. Hannah was so frightened, she could barely move. she stood in front of the child in her care, took off her sun bonnet, began screaming and waved the hat for help. it turns out, the bear was more frightened than Hannah and he ran off. later, Hannah ran a grocery in this town. this is Windsor, New Hampshire. she sold from — r and developed a reputation for mixing delicious hot toddies. she never married. she tended for Thomas murdo and his wife in their old age. when she got old, she lived in a house in the upper village in Hillsboro and complained about her taxes. in those days, it was allowed for a property owner to work out their tax bills by improving the public highway instead of having to give money. old Hannah, she used to appear on the road in the spring with a shovel and a hoe, ready for work, as ready as any man to do what she had to do to pay her taxes. as she aged, she was taken in by her family, the children and nieces and nephews of the murdo family. in the end, she lived in the same house where she was raised which was then owned by Mrs. david gould. here she was tenderly cared for until he death on January 14,1868. she died in the same room she had slept in as a 10-year-old. she was at the time 98 years (…)